In what is being called a hate crime, three elderly women (between the ages of 84 and 90) were tied up, tased, and their hom ransacked.
According to the Christian Post:
Three Mennonite women were attacked with a stun gun simply because of their faith, police said on Sunday. Dereck Taylor Holt was charged with aggravated assault, ethnic intimidation, burglary and other offenses and is being held by Lancaster, Pennsylvania police.
While police chief David Steffen told the Associated Press that Holt did not know the women personally, he did know that they were Mennonite and attacked them for that reason. During the assault, which lasted several hours, he tied up the elderly women, used a stun gun on them, ransacked their home, and read Bible verses before destroying the book.
“There is no direct information that linked these individuals to targeting by the suspect. The only thing that linked them was his bias based upon their faith. They suffered multiple electrical shocks, were incapacitated and left. They were unable to move for a long period of time. That could have led to bad things like blood clots and positional asphyxia,” Steffen told the Intelligencer Journal/Lancaster New Era.
Holt allegedly told the women that he was a former Mennonite but gave no further information as to why he would attack them. He allegedly told the women he was a previous member of the faith and had significant anger towards all members since leaving the tradition.
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